D-Wave (Nasdaq: QBTS) and NTT DOCOMO (93+ million subscriptions, Japan's largest mobile operator) announced DOCOMO's second production-grade quantum application, running on D-Wave's hybrid annealing platform via Leap. The application optimizes Tracking Area Lists across DOCOMO's network, reducing daily peak location registration signaling by 65.3% and paging signaling by 7.0%, two metrics that typically move in opposite directions, making a simultaneous reduction unusually difficult. In a representative benchmark spanning 333 base stations, the solver completed the optimization in about five minutes; the results are now built into DOCOMO's live network planning and daily operations.

This is a second production deployment at the same major customer, DOCOMO's first D-Wave application (paging signal reduction) is still running, and this extends quantum optimization to a distinct, more complex problem at the same carrier. That's a genuinely different signal than most single-use-case quantum customer stories: real evidence of expanding usage within one account.

This is exactly the kind of "second use case at an existing customer" evidence that answers question about whether commercial engagements ever go beyond an initial proof-of-concept for D-Wave. DOCOMO explicitly did not stop at one application. Worth checking whether D-Wave's next earnings call quantifies DOCOMO as a named recurring revenue source, or if this stays confined to "furnished," not "filed," 8-K disclosure language (as this announcement was), which carries less legal weight than a standard financial filing.

D-Wave Quantum Inc. (2026, August 18). D-Wave technology drives NTT DOCOMO's second production quantum application in network operations. D-Wave Quantum. https://www.dwavequantum.com/company/newsroom/press-release/d-wave-technology-drives-ntt-docomo-s-second-production-quantum-application-in-network-operations